The U.S. government has given the nod to what
could become one of the most ambitious ecological restoration
projects ever attempted: rescuing the Salton Sea, a giant lake in
Southern California that has become a deathtrap for wildlife. On 13
January; the Interior Department released a blueprint for healing the
lake, now on a fast track to looking as lifeless as the Dead Sea. But
Congress must come up with $1 billion or more to pay for a full-scale
restoration.

Created 95 years ago when engineers accidentally
diverted the Colorado River into a desert trough, the Salton Sea once
thrived as a resort. But years of agricultural drainage made the
984-square-kilometer lake ever saltier and loaded it with nutrients
that spur oxygen-depleting algal blooms. Nowadays it's the scene of
fish kills and bird die-offs. Despite its woes, many biologists say,
the Salton provides critical habitat for birds moving along the
Pacific Flyway, a major migratory pathway, as well as for endangered
species such as the brown pelican. The lake's boosters succeeded in
convincing Congress to pass a 1998 law that directs Interior to
consider solutions for freshening the water, now 25% saltier than
seawater, and improving it as a habitat (Science, 2 April 1999,
p.28).

Congress also landed $5 million in studies to
reconnoiter the lake's chemistry and biology. The just-released
results have "dispelled a lot of perceptions" about the sea's health,
says wildlife disease biologist Milton Friend, chair of the
multiagency Salton Sea Science Subcommittee. "For the first time, we
have some good, solid information" that eases concerns that the lake
is too polluted to bother saving. Absolved as suspects in the
die-offs are pesticides and the element selenium (concentrations of
both are too low), and algal toxins, which so far in lab tests do not
appear to harm vertebrates. However, many fish are covered with
parasitic worms, reflecting unhealthy conditions that might make them
more susceptible to other pathogens. Its penchant for poisoning its
inhabitants aside, the lake teems with a remarkable array of
life-forms. Scientists have counted over 300 organisms not previously
reported there, including many microbes new to science. Their studies
will appear later this year in Hydmbiologia.

Having concluded that the Salton Sea is worth
salvaging as a resource for wildlife, recreation, and agriculture,
Interior officials endorse building an evaporation plant and ponds to
remove salts, and they have suggested schemes for pumping in fresher
water or moving salty water out. Their plan also calls for a
permanent science office that would fund studies and work with
management on solutions. Congress will need to appropriate money for
these projects, which Interior officials admit could cost $1 billion
or more over the next 30 years.

Rest
stop, in need of restoration. Interior has
released a blueprint for saving California's Salton Sea, a
mecca for migrating birds.

In the meantime, Salton managers have $8.5 million
in hand to move ahead with a pilot project an evaporation tower that
will spray a fine mist of lake water into a holding pond, where salt
will precipitate. They're also seeking to pay a commercial trawler to
harvest fish, which by removing the nutrients sequestered in the
fish's bodies would lead to a healthier ecosystem, and they've hired
a wildlife biologist whose job is to anticipate and take preemptive
measures to alleviate disease outbreaks.

Some critics say the plan doesn't go far enough to
tackle tough issues such as stemming the flow of nutrients into the
lake. "Birds and fish are going to continue to die unless they
address these other problems," says Michael Cohen of the Pacific
Institute, a think tank in Oakland, California. The plan does leave
many issues unresolved, says Stuart Hurlbert, a limnologist at San
Diego State University and staunch restoration advocate, but
undertaking a pilot project First, he says, "seems a reasonable way
to go?"